March 2015 Comic Book Sales to Comics Shops

Estimated Comics Shipped to North American Comics Shops
Based on Reports from Diamond Comic Distributors

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March closed the winter quarter of 2015 on a mildly positive note in the comics industry. Comic shops ordered nearly $42 million in comics and graphic novels, up about 3% over the previous March, which like this one had four shipping weeks.

Marvel's relaunch of the Star Wars line continued to energize what is usually a lighter quarter for new releases, with Princess Leia#1 taking the top slot and Star Wars #3 coming in second. The second issue of Princess Leia also made the top five, and Darth Vader #2 took eighth place. There weren't even four Star Wars titles in the Top 10 in May 1999when Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace #1-4 all came out; the fourth issue of that placed 11th. So this is the first month four Star Wars titles have been in the Top 10 list in the Diamond Exclusive Era. (Before that, we'd have to look at 1977, and when the waves of Whitman's reprints for the original Star Wars #1-3 were hitting; that would have put multiple Star Wars issues high on the charts. But we have no way of knowing how many of those came out, and in what months.)

Orders for the quarter totaled $127.9 million, up $11 million from the first quarter of 2014, which had an equal number of shipping weeks, despite what the calendar shows. (The first Wednesday of 2014 was counted with the December 2013 sales.)

This list includes all items on Diamond's Top 3 charts, plus any post-#300 items from its Top 50 Indy and Small Publisher charts. If you don't see a book, Diamond released no data for it.
Items marked with asterisks [*] had their reported orders reduced by 10% due to returnability.
The links lead to current listings for each issue on eBay. You can also find the books at your comics shop.

All comics sold by Diamond (in dollars)(
+11% vs. same month previous year)

Year to date(
+14% vs. previous year)

GRAPHIC NOVEL DOLLAR SALES

The Top 300 Graphic Novels sold had a total retail price of$6.23 million

(
-28% vs. same month previous year)(
-40% vs. same month 5 years earlier)(
-12% vs. same month 10 years earlier, comparing just the Top 100 vs. Top 100)(
+22% vs. same month 15 years earlier, comparing just the Top 25 vs. the Top 25)

The Top 300 Comics and Top 300 Graphic Novels sold had a combined total retail price of$31.4 million

(
-1% vs. same month previous year)(
+5% vs. same month 5 years earlier)(
+14% vs. same month 10 years earlier, comparing just the Top 100 GNs vs. Top 100 GNs)(
+73% vs. same month 15 years earlier, comparing just the Top 25 GNs vs. the Top 25 GNs)

Category to date for year:$98.42 million(
+11% vs. previous year)

All comics and graphic novels sold by Diamond (in dollars)(
+3% vs. same month previous year)

Note: This category diverges slightly from Diamond's reported measures for all comics and graphic novels. Slight differences are introduced by the presence of magazines and other factors.

Average cost of comics in the Top 300:$3.71

Average cost of comics in the Top 300, weighted by orders:$3.72

Average cost of comics in the Top 25:$3.83

Median cost of comics in the Top 300:$3.99

Most common cost of comics in the Top 300:$3.99

MARKET SHARES

Share of Overall Units

Marvel

41.53%

DC

26.13%

Image

12.98%

IDW

5.16%

Dark Horse

3.07%

Boom

2.44%

Dynamite

1.99%

Valiant

0.99%

Titan

0.77%

Avatar

0.69%

Archie

0.58%

Oni

0.47%

Zenescope

0.47%

Viz

0.37%

Eaglemoss

0.32%

Action Lab

0.20%

Random House

0.18%

Hachette

0.10%

St. Martins

0.07%

Humanoids

0.03%

Other

1.45%

Share of Overall Dollars

Marvel

38.82%

DC

23.01%

Image

11.39%

IDW

6.51%

Dark Horse

3.90%

Boom

2.41%

Dynamite

2.37%

Eaglemoss

1.83%

Titan

1.01%

Viz

0.98%

Avatar

0.94%

Valiant

0.85%

Archie

0.60%

Random House

0.56%

Oni

0.54%

Zenescope

0.52%

Hachette

0.35%

Humanoids

0.27%

Action Lab

0.26%

St. Martins

0.26%

Other

2.61%

Items in Top 300

Marvel

81

DC

75

Image

44

IDW

32

Dark Horse

18

Boom

12

Dynamite

9

Valiant

7

Archie

5

Avatar

4

Titan

4

Bongo

2

Zenescope

2

Abstract

1

Broadsword

1

Benitez

1

Oni

1

United Plankton

1

Share of Units in Top 300

Marvel

47.17%

DC

27.38%

Image

12.46%

IDW

4.56%

Dark Horse

2.43%

Boom

1.37%

Valiant

1.02%

Dynamite

0.98%

Titan

0.72%

Archie

0.48%

Avatar

0.41%

Benitez

0.22%

Oni

0.21%

Bongo

0.17%

Zenescope

0.15%

Abstract

0.10%

United Plankton

0.09%

Broadsword

0.08%

Share of Dollars in Top 300

Marvel

51.05%

DC

24.54%

Image

10.80%

IDW

4.97%

Dark Horse

2.39%

Boom

1.47%

Valiant

1.09%

Dynamite

1.05%

Titan

0.77%

Archie

0.52%

Avatar

0.44%

Benitez

0.30%

Zenescope

0.16%

Bongo

0.14%

Abstract

0.11%

United Plankton

0.07%

Broadsword

0.07%

Oni

0.06%

Dollar Share of Top 300 Comics & Top 300 TPBs

Marvel

47.02%

DC

23.99%

Image

13.40%

IDW

5.15%

Dark Horse

3.03%

Boom

1.34%

Dynamite

1.27%

Valiant

1.01%

Titan

0.86%

Archie

0.47%

Avatar

0.44%

Oni

0.31%

Viz

0.27%

Benitez

0.24%

Humanoids

0.17%

Zenescope

0.15%

Random House

0.14%

Bongo

0.11%

Udon

0.11%

Abstract

0.09%

Hachette

0.08%

PS Artbooks

0.06%

United Plankton

0.06%

Broadsword

0.05%

St. Martins

0.05%

Action Lab

0.05%

Scholastic

0.04%

Putnam

0.02%

Renegade Arts

0.02%

Fantagraphics

0.01%

New comics released

DC

85

Marvel

79

Image

59

IDW

52

Boom

40

Dynamite

28

Dark Horse

27

Titan

8

Other

77

TOTAL

455

New graphic novels released

Marvel

30

Viz

27

Dark Horse

22

Image

20

IDW

18

DC

17

Titan

7

Dynamite

6

Boom

3

Other

108

TOTAL

258

THE FINE PRINT

The monthly sales estimates at right are for items shipped by Diamond Comic Distributors, the largest comic-book distributor in North America.

Diamond does not publish sales figures; instead it publishes "indexed" sales tables, in which it keys orders for all comics it lists sales for to a single comic book (usually Batman), with one “order index point” being equal to 1% of that title’s orders.

Along with other methods, we use the actual Diamond final orders from titles to approximate what an order index point equals each month.The result is applied to the Diamond charts to produce the estimates seen at right.

The figures represent only those comics and graphic novels that Diamond shipped to North American retailers in the calendar month. While Diamond's sales represent the majority of periodicals in circulation, they are a smaller portion of the overall graphic novel market.

An item may appear in more than one month's charts due to reorders; for a better idea of a comic book's overall sales, look for its end-of-year sales in the Year Overview section, where available.

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